Centre Wellington Votes asked eleven questions covering vision, housing, infrastructure, taxes, recreation, the economy, tourism, the environment, governance, and accountability. Here are my complete, unedited answers.
Centre Wellington is not at a crossroads. We are past it. The decisions shaping this community for the next 50 years are being made by default, not design. The Short-Term Rental bylaw was drafted, reviewed, and deferred three times. The Housing Strategy was never adopted. 605 households are in core housing need — 335 of them in severe core housing need — per our own Housing Needs Assessment. Every year we delay is a year those families spend waiting.
I spent a decade as a hostage negotiator and corrections officer, showing up for people in crisis, finding solutions under pressure. I'm running to bring that same commitment here.
These are commitments with a public scorecard. Come back in 2030 and hold me to them.
Centre Wellington needs housing that fills the missing middle: fourplexes permitted as-of-right on existing lots, mixed housing types mandated in new subdivisions, and purpose-built rental incentivized over further sprawl.
Infrastructure leads growth. No subdivision approval proceeds without confirmed water and wastewater capacity and a funded servicing plan. The Asset Management Plan is the framework. Growth pays its own way.
Four tools expand affordable and rental supply: fourplexes as-of-right under the Planning Act, Development Charge reductions for purpose-built rental under the Development Charges Act, a dedicated housing reserve funded through the Municipal Accommodation Tax, and a municipal surplus land inventory offered to non-profit housing providers.
Growth-related costs belong to growth. Full Development Charges apply to market-rate development, with a tiered structure — more for greenfield sprawl, less for serviced infill — that accurately prices what growth truly costs. Utilize Bill 17's $2.3B provincial fund to close infrastructure gaps without loading costs onto existing taxpayers.
Licensing bylaw adopted within 90 days.
South Fergus Secondary Plan and STR regulation share the same principle: community-defined standards must precede approval, not follow it. The Community Planning Permit System achieves this for planning. When the rules come first, the decisions are defensible.
Funding each priority: water and wastewater capacity tied to growth is funded through Development Charges. Bill 17's Housing-Enabling Water Systems and Municipal Housing Infrastructure Funds are pursued aggressively. Roads and bridges draw on the Asset Management reserve, OCIF, and Connecting Links grants. Active transportation connects to federal and provincial programs.
Quarterly project status published at centrewellington.ca. All change orders over $50,000 require a council report before approval. A public deficiency and warranty register is updated quarterly. No project closes without a completion and warranty report.
An annual increase in the range of 3 to 5 percent is sustainable — indexed to real cost increases in labour, materials, and contracted services, and sufficient to meet the Asset Management Plan's reserve funding requirements. An artificial cap that suppresses the tax rate today defers maintenance costs that compound into far larger expenditures tomorrow. Property taxes are a funding commitment to residents who use the services, not a political negotiating tool.
Asset Management reserve funding. The 25-year infrastructure model I championed during my previous term must be protected and fully funded. Underfunding this reserve is how municipalities replace a $2 million bridge they should have maintained for $200,000.
Multi-Use Recreation Facility scope, not the commitment. Feasibility, design, and grant applications continue now. If the confirmed funding plan supports a smaller footprint, we build smaller — the plan decides the size, not politics.
Debt is appropriate for long-life assets that benefit future users: water infrastructure, bridges, major facilities. Reserves are not a tax-suppression tool — they represent real future obligations. The Asset Management Plan's drawdown schedule is the standard.
Centre Wellington's largest recreation gap is indoor multi-use space: a gymnasium, indoor turf, year-round walking track, and flexible programming rooms serving all demographics regardless of weather or season. The Sportsplex serves its purpose but doesn't fill this gap. The Parks and Recreation Needs Assessment confirms both the demand and the growth pressure on existing facilities.
The most underserved residents are youth and rural ward communities. Teenagers in Centre Wellington lack dedicated space that is genuinely theirs — somewhere to go after school, in winter, without having to play a sport to qualify. Rural residents in Pilkington Township and West Garafraxa have fewer options than those near the Sportsplex. Geography shouldn't determine access to recreation, or to the social connection it provides. It is also a mental health intervention, something I understand from direct professional experience.
Complete the MURF feasibility and funding study with discipline before council commits. In parallel, direct staff to audit rural programming gaps and test satellite programming at existing community halls and school gyms while the long-term facility plan is finalized. That interim step costs very little. The gap it closes is real.
Two practical actions for local businesses and agriculture:
Any major industrial proposal, distribution facility, or large employer must pass four tests before I'll support it — not barriers, the standard applied to every significant proposal:
On all major industrial applications, independent peer review of applicant-funded studies is required. The applicant's reports are the starting point, not the conclusion.
Tourism is part of what makes Centre Wellington worth protecting, but tourism that erodes the experience of living here isn't sustainable for residents or visitors. Responsible growth means using the Municipal Accommodation Tax to fund resident-benefit infrastructure first and commissioning an economic impact assessment showing where tourism dollars land and who holds the jobs.
Protecting residents from visitor pressure requires enforceable traffic plans for peak-season events, a downtown parking strategy that reserves residential streets for residents, and CPPS policies giving communities a voice before new tourist commercial uses land in residential neighbourhoods.
Tourism must pay its fair share. MAT revenue flows into three buckets: the housing reserve, infrastructure strained by visitor volume, and tourism promotion only after those obligations are met.
These protections accommodate required growth by directing density to already-designated, already-serviced land. Density is not the threat — unplanned sprawl is.
100 percent of new residential development approvals occur within the existing settlement boundary, decided under Community Planning Permit System rules, with zero new greenfield servicing infrastructure funded from the tax levy.
Strong mayor powers are an absolute last resort. As a trained crisis negotiator, I build to consensus every time. That doesn't change here. I can't picture overriding an elected council. But I didn't see a pandemic coming either, so I won't say never.
Budget direction protecting Asset Management reserve funding and housing commitments a divided council might dilute.
Vetoing planning refusals without documented justification, reviewable before taking effect.
Every exercise requires written notice, a 10-day comment period, and a published rationale — recorded, public, no exceptions.
Deputy Mayor: I will hear council's views, then choose the nominee myself — council holds only the confirming vote. Starting criterion: someone from outside my own ward, so leadership reflects the whole township. Not a reward for supporters or opponents. Council trust depends on it.
Recorded votes: Mandatory on all Official Plan amendments, zoning amendments, major development applications, and zoning exceptions. Non-negotiable.
Wellington County Council: A published brief within five days of each meeting — how I voted and why — posted at centrewellington.ca and social media. Residents deserve to know what County decided and what their mayor said.
The single greatest challenge is the housing affordability crisis — documented, quantified, worsening. Our own Housing Needs Assessment confirms 605 households in core housing need — 335 of them in severe core housing need — a shortfall of 334 units per year, and a rental market where a full-time minimum-wage worker can't afford a two-bedroom unit. This is not an abstraction — it's a local failure with real families behind every number.
Centre Wellington's greatest opportunity over the next decade is the convergence of three conditions that rarely align: $2.3 billion in provincial infrastructure funding through Bill 17, new strong mayor powers that allow faster housing decisions, and an incoming council mandated to make planning a resident's tool, not a developer's. That window won't stay open.
Major decisions require a minimum 60-day written comment period, two in-person public meetings in affected areas, and a written response to all substantive submissions before a council vote. Consultation is complete only when residents have been genuinely heard and their input reflected in the record.
Consultant contracts over $50,000 require a competitive RFP with public scope and evaluation criteria, and a value-for-money report within 90 days of completion. Results must be acted on or publicly explained within one term. Studies left on shelves are the appearance of transparency, not the substance.
I championed the Township's Asset Management Plan during my 2018–2022 term — a 25-year infrastructure funding model underpinning every capital decision the municipality makes.
I did not move fast enough on short-term rental regulation — the issue arose during my term. Investor-owned STRs grew from 144 to 235 units between 2022 and 2025, directly compounding the crisis. I should have pushed harder, earlier.
I'd have moved a licensing bylaw framework in 2019, not waited for a consensus that never came.
Zero. No personal business interest touched any matter before council.